AWS - Expanding EC2 to larger type (Example : micro -> large)

Question

So the whole purpose of me moving my mobile app from shared server to Amazon Web Services is so that I can hopefully start out with minimal storage space and cpu usage and expand as I need to without any app downtime. In other words, in my app all I am doing is calling some php scripts that then store data to a MySql db and upload / save some data files to disk. Is it possible to expand without having to create a whole new instance that has more CPU / Storage / Ram capabilities and then having to migrate all my php scripts over to the new instance? I'm new to AWS so I'm hoping to learn.

Answer 1

You can create an image of your current instance called an AMI (requires reboot of your instance). Then you can create a new instance of any size using that AMI (so you won't have to migrate anything).

You can eliminate downtime by having both your new instance and your original instance running simultaneously, switch your Elastic IPs (if you have any) and take the original server offline.

The only downtime will be a minute or 2 while your machine reboots from the AMI creation.

Documentation: http://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSEC2/latest/UserGuide/creating-an-ami-ebs.html

Note: This is all assuming that your database is somewhere else (like in an RDS instance) that is not installed on your EC2 instance. If it is (or you save files and other stateful information on the webserver), then I suggest following Mar Cejas's advice and just take the server down and start it back up as a different size.

Answer 2

Stop the running instance and change the instance type and start it back.

Update:

Here's the screenshot on how to upgrade your instance: